Arms changes are not enough

[Grand Marshal.4098]

For competetive the window of opportunity to get value out of Burst Precision is not enough to even cast 90% of a warrior's damage. There is also literall no reason as to why the ferocity should only be limited to a measly 50. Level 60 foods give better ferocity....

Double the duration of the crit chance increase buff (we are not guards or eles or necros with pulsing damage around us or on fields) and don't split the ferocity from PvE. 150 Ferocity it worth taking the trait for as a POWER FOCUSED GRANDMASTER trait, especially for elite specs that need to drop discipline or take Arms as the third line. 

 

EDIT: Not to mention how terribly unreliable the crit chance on bleeding foes is for competetive, as all situational crit chance traits.

Edited December 10, 2023 by Grand Marshal.4098

[Yerlock.4678]

7 hours ago, Grand Marshal.4098 said:

For competetive the window of opportunity to get value out of Burst Precision is not enough to even cast 90% of a warrior's damage. There is also literall no reason as to why the ferocity should only be limited to a measly 50. Level 60 foods give better ferocity....

Double the duration of the crit chance increase buff (we are not guards or eles or necros with pulsing damage around us or on fields) and don't split the ferocity from PvE. 150 Ferocity it worth taking the trait for as a POWER FOCUSED GRANDMASTER trait, especially for elite specs that need to drop discipline or take Arms as the third line. 

 

EDIT: Not to mention how terribly unreliable the crit chance on bleeding foes is for competetive, as all situational crit chance traits.

fax

[Lighter.5631]

yea, still only gunflame meme is playable with arms

dropping defense means you will die to the most meme-y low tier builds, like blind spam/condi spam.

unless you play hit and run like other classes running non sustain lines, but warrior does not have the skills to allow hit and run game play, there's not a single weapon is suited for hit and run, gunflame is the closest thing a warrior can build for hit and run, but it's called a meme for a reason. there's no way for warrior to build for a serious hit-and-run build

 

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

As mentioned in this thread:

Quote

We have to take defense because resilient roll is necessary to protect bursts from blind and weakness.

Discipline is mandatory for warrior to function in pvp.

So we won't be taking arms.

 

Quote

only gunflame meme is playable with arms

This balancing direction is not uncommon, but is frustrating nonetheless. These kinds of patch notes constantly favor the least interactive of the warrior builds at the cost of the more engaging, aggressive variants, both when they're being introduced and when they're getting nerfed because that rifle warrior hit an ele for three billion damage or whatever. 

It always happens. Some minmax build people don't like interacting with gets buffed, then the complaints are used to not only disassemble it but other builds that may have been using the pre-buffed skills and traits that just so happened to be part of the FotM build. 

Edited December 11, 2023 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Jobber.6348]

All things considered, the Burst traits should really belong in Discipline. Still wondering why there's a Healing Effectiveness trait in Discipline and why Crack Shot hasn't been moved to Arms yet as a minor. 

Am I wrong? Say even if you don't wanna run Discipline, if Crackshot was moved to Arms, it serves Gunflame builds better. 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Yasai.3549

[Jzaku.9765]

6 hours ago, Yasai.3549 said:

All things considered, the Burst traits should really belong in Discipline. Still wondering why there's a Healing Effectiveness trait in Discipline and why Crack Shot hasn't been moved to Arms yet as a minor. 

Am I wrong? Say even if you don't wanna run Discipline, if Crackshot was moved to Arms, it serves Gunflame builds better. 

You are wrong on a fundamental level insisting on pigeon-holing traits.

For example, all of PVE Warrior's support traits have been in tactics these past ~8(?) years (since the new trait system) competing against each other, the end result being that Warrior can't scrape together a decent support build at all since you have... Tactics, and 2 other traitlines that do literally nothing.

Ask yourself if you would prefer Might Makes Right in Defense instead of Strength, since it's "clearly a self-sustain trait and therefore belongs in Defense". Have fun dropping anything in Defense for Might Makes Right, since it would compete with all the S tier traits in there. 

[Jobber.6348]

22 minutes ago, Jzaku.9765 said:

Ask yourself if you would prefer Might Makes Right in Defense instead of Strength, since it's "clearly a self-sustain trait and therefore belongs in Defense". Have fun dropping anything in Defense for Might Makes Right, since it would compete with all the S tier traits in there. 

MMR is in Strength because it is a traitline that revolves around Might, not because it's a "defensive trait" 

That's why I think Bursts should end up in Discipline as a traitline that revolves around benefiting Bursts. 

Let me turn this back on you then:

Ask yourself if Stalwart Focus really belongs in Discipline especially when it's sitting in the same tier as Warrior's Sprint and Crackshot. And the even more sore point is how it has 0 interaction with Bursts, Adrenaline or Weapon Swapping. It's literally something that probably belongs in Tactics. 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Yasai.3549

[Jzaku.9765]

27 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

Let me turn this back on you then:

Ask yourself if Stalwart Focus really belongs in Discipline especially when it's sitting in the same tier as Warrior's Sprint and Crackshot. And the even more sore point is how it has 0 interaction with Bursts, Adrenaline or Weapon Swapping. It's literally something that probably belongs in Tactics. 

I literally bring this exact scenario up in my previous reply. 

[Grand Marshal.4098]

I can go on a long tangent on where I think traits should be and why Fast Hands should be baseline (since the mechanic for warrior is bursts, not weaponswap, aka improve burst colldowns via a traitline, not QoL features like weaponswap).

Did I mention that Scorched Earth doesn't even proc Burst Precision? 

I tried to check for builds like Arms Strength Zerker bow/gs and the damage compared to discipline is similar, while you forego so many qol stuff. Kinda ironic considering Arms is meant to define a more clear DPS role.

Tried to gain value out of hammer builds with Spb, core and zerker with a mix of Arms/Strength or Defense (or both combined) and Mad King relic. Terrible experience. Starving for adrenaline, starving for mobility (without warrior's sprint its tough) and the loss of weaponswapping makes chaining CC and damage a brutal experience between weaponsets.

The changes which I proposed initially, maybe with a proper buff to Sundering Bursts and either life leech in bloodlust or a strike damage increase, may make arms worth taking and that's a huge if, cause the numbers don't lie. 

kitten, playing with Furious does better dps on power builds than with burst precision in comp. You can spike +250 condi damage and have perma adrenaline on bow zerker (and youd be surprised how much burning actually works on pugs and clouds). 

 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

4 hours ago, Jzaku.9765 said:

I literally bring this exact scenario up in my previous reply. 

That is more of a problem with none of the Especs offering true support options.

Since the beginning of the game the 5 core traitlines have been something of this nature:

• Power DPS
• Condi DPS
• Self Sustain
• Group Support
• Profession Mechanic

All with various minor focuses, i.e. Arms is our condi and crit chance tree while Discipline focused on Bursts, weapon swapping, and critical damage historically.

Tactics remaining the Group Support line is in keeping with the basic structure of traitlines. The two main issues with warrior support have always been the lack of a MH or 2H support weapon and an accompanying support focused Espec.

After Staff ships formally, we will still need a proper MH support weapon to pair with Warhorn and a support focused Espec. Just shoving quickness or alacrity onto a single trait within two of the especs does not make them support specs.

[Jzaku.9765]

1 hour ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

That is more of a problem with none of the Especs offering true support options.

Since the beginning of the game the 5 core traitlines have been something of this nature:

• Power DPS
• Condi DPS
• Self Sustain
• Group Support
• Profession Mechanic

All with various minor focuses, i.e. Arms is our condi and crit chance tree while Discipline focused on Bursts, weapon swapping, and critical damage historically.

Tactics remaining the Group Support line is in keeping with the basic structure of traitlines. The two main issues with warrior support have always been the lack of a MH or 2H support weapon and an accompanying support focused Espec.

After Staff ships formally, we will still need a proper MH support weapon to pair with Warhorn and a support focused Espec. Just shoving quickness or alacrity onto a single trait within two of the especs does not make them support specs.

First, the issues you point out that hold Support Warrior back are not mutually exclusive with having a bad second support traitline. Both can be true. But within Tactics line itself, you have:

• Warhorn's Boon trait competing with Warrior's only team Protection trait in Adept
• Extra Shout + Cleanse = Heal competing with increased Soldier's Focus Radius in Master
• Stab trait competing with Shout Heal trait competing with Phalanx in Grandmaster

When Warrior would have had a significantly better starting foot were some of these traits in ANY other traitline, as opposed to all being in Tactics "because it's the Support traitline".

 

Second, Stop conflating theme/flavour with game mechanics. Once again by your own definition you are saying that [Might Makes Right] is in the "wrong" traitline, by pigeon-holing Strength as the "Power DPS" traitline. Strength is simply about "Strength", in all forms. Hence why a trait like [Brave Stride] which has nothing to do with Might OR Power DPS is also in the line alongside MMR, providing the traitline another utility pick while still being in theme as bravery is a form of "Strength" of will. 

 

It is not rocket science that having traits of varying effects within one traitline is nothing but a positive. You've never needed 9 Power DPS traits in all of Strength's Major Traits, just as you don't need 9 [Condi DPS/Support/On-burst] effects in [Arms/Tactics/Disc].

[Jzaku.9765]

And to be on-topic, frankly, Arms changes were not enough because people keep crying for it to be a Strength replacement purely for variety in the builds they've played for years, when you already have Strength. That, or they just want power creeped Strength that's just as strong but lets them run 0 Precision. All that development effort would have been much better served adding utility traits into Arms that fit into the Arms theme instead of trying to make it Strength-esque for Power DPS builds. 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Jzaku.9765

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

1 hour ago, Jzaku.9765 said:

First, the issues you point out that hold Support Warrior back are not mutually exclusive with having a bad second support traitline. Both can be true. But within Tactics line itself, you have:

• Warhorn's Boon trait competing with Warrior's only team Protection trait in Adept
• Extra Shout + Cleanse = Heal competing with increased Soldier's Focus Radius in Master
• Stab trait competing with Shout Heal trait competing with Phalanx in Grandmaster

When Warrior would have had a significantly better starting foot were some of these traits in ANY other traitline, as opposed to all being in Tactics "because it's the Support traitline".

That's the structure of the game. Don't know what else to tell you there.

1 hour ago, Jzaku.9765 said:

Second, Stop conflating theme/flavour with game mechanics. Once again by your own definition you are saying that [Might Makes Right] is in the "wrong" traitline, by pigeon-holing Strength as the "Power DPS" traitline. Strength is simply about "Strength", in all forms. Hence why a trait like [Brave Stride] which has nothing to do with Might OR Power DPS is also in the line alongside MMR, providing the traitline another utility pick while still being in theme as bravery is a form of "Strength" of will. 

Strength has always been about power, might generation, and endurance gain. I did mention that these all had a minor focus to them, and that is still the case. 

1 hour ago, Jzaku.9765 said:

It is not rocket science that having traits of varying effects within one traitline is nothing but a positive. You've never needed 9 Power DPS traits in all of Strength's Major Traits, just as you don't need 9 [Condi DPS/Support/On-burst] effects in [Arms/Tactics/Disc].

Yes, it isn't rocket science. The 5 core traitlines all follow a pattern across all 9 professions. The especs are where the professions get fleshed out into more defined roles, which is why Warrior having 3 DPS especs is such a glaring error in judgement from Anet.

[TugboatSteve.3607]

I honestly just don't understand what the purpose is behind rolling bleed into crit procs.

Crit is kind of an all-or-nothing power stat that has no inherent synergy with bleed damage.

The trees in this game are weird and restrictive, whereas from a design standpoint they're supposed to provide more flexibility than other comparable systems for different build options.

I also feel like the most common complaint, the lack of sustain in Arms, wasn't addressed.

7 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Yes, it isn't rocket science. The 5 core traitlines all follow a pattern across all 9 professions. The especs are where the professions get fleshed out into more defined roles, which is why Warrior having 3 DPS especs is such a glaring error in judgement from Anet.

I don't know that I buy that Spellbreaker is a DPS spec since it's pretty bad at that. It revolves around full counter and boonrip for the most part, and a lot of the abilities break in PvP, presumably because FC comes on to a new role defensively and as a crowd control option. When I look at the actual Spellbreaker tree, I don't even see a single thing that jumps out at me as a clear "DPS" optimization choice.

Mostly, I just don't like Bladesworn because the playstyle just feels awful, and it locks you out of a weapon slot in combat.

Anyway, the billing behind the game from the beginning, as I understood it, was to explicitly avoid the holy trinity archetypes. I find the entire concept of a "DPS" spec or even DPS in general as a mechanic to be pretty galling. You can see this in pristine form in World of Warcraft where the entire game design revolves around avoiding deathtraps while perfectly executing mechanical button rotations.

Side note, but the boon standardization doing a great job of making group composition an equally if not moreso annoying puzzle fit to the Holy Trinity games. What is the point of bringing a boon that you already have? This game doesn't need any more "defined roles," it doesn't need boon puzzles and "bring the boon, not the player" garbage, it needs flexibility and build diversity, and this ain't it.

The call from the community has been "why can't class X have boon Y." Further reductionism and bad game design choices follow this criticism. They keep going further down this rabbit hole with every major class patch.

That said, I will admit that the boon puzzle fit design does at least avoid the worst trapping of the holy trinity games. DPS and healer specs in other meterboard games are entirely reduced down to raw number throughput, with utility being a distant secondary. So people simply look at the meterboards and make their class selections based on whichever class has the highest theoretical or realworld DPS/HPS throughput. This is also why Blizzard is so reluctant to make class numbers tuning during raid seasons - people pick whoever is at the top of the leaderboard at the start of the season, and they wait until world first to make any balancing decisions to avoid upsetting world firsters.

Edited December 13, 2023 by TugboatSteve.3607

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

27 minutes ago, TugboatSteve.3607 said:

I honestly just don't understand what the purpose is behind rolling bleed into crit procs.

Crit is kind of an all-or-nothing power stat that has no inherent synergy with bleed damage.

The trees in this game are weird and restrictive, whereas from a design standpoint they're supposed to provide more flexibility than other comparable systems for different build options.

I also feel like the most common complaint, the lack of sustain in Arms, wasn't addressed.

I don't know that I buy that Spellbreaker is a DPS spec since it's pretty bad at that. It revolves around full counter and boonrip for the most part, and a lot of the abilities break in PvP, presumably because FC comes on to a new role defensively and as a crowd control option. When I look at the actual Spellbreaker tree, I don't even see a single thing that jumps out at me as a clear "DPS" optimization choice.

Mostly, I just don't like Bladesworn because the playstyle just feels awful, and it locks you out of a weapon slot in combat.

Anyway, the billing behind the game from the beginning, as I understood it, was to explicitly avoid the holy trinity archetypes. I find the entire concept of a "DPS" spec or even DPS in general as a mechanic to be pretty galling. You can see this in pristine form in World of Warcraft where the entire game design revolves around avoiding deathtraps while perfectly executing mechanical button rotations.

Side note, but the boon standardization doing a great job of making group composition an equally if not moreso annoying puzzle fit to the Holy Trinity games. What is the point of bringing a boon that you already have? This game doesn't need any more "defined roles," it doesn't need boon puzzles and "bring the boon, not the player" garbage, it needs flexibility and build diversity, and this ain't it.

The call from the community has been "why can't class X have boon Y." Further reductionism and bad game design choices follow this criticism. They keep going further down this rabbit hole with every major class patch.

That said, I will admit that the boon puzzle fit design does at least avoid the worst trapping of the holy trinity games. DPS and healer specs in other meterboard games are entirely reduced down to raw number throughput, with utility being a distant secondary. So people simply look at the meterboards and make their class selections based on whichever class has the highest theoretical or realworld DPS/HPS throughput. This is also why Blizzard is so reluctant to make class numbers tuning during raid seasons - people pick whoever is at the top of the leaderboard at the start of the season, and they wait until world first to make any balancing decisions to avoid upsetting world firsters.

Bleed on crit is something that has existed since the beginning. It was an attempt to force condi builds to also rely on precision. Spellbreaker functions well as a DPS in PvE, but because of CMC's balance philosophy does less so in PvP/WvW. It is still essentially Power Damage + boon rips.

This games was supposed to be about damage-control-support with every profession having viable roles in all three, but that hasn't played out in practice for quite a while.